Masinissa, with not more than fifty horsemen, disengaged himself from the defile by passing through steep descents of the mountains, which were not known to his pursuers.
Bocchar, however, followed close upon him, and overtaking him in the open plains near Clupea, so effectually surrounded him, that he slew every one of his attendants except four horsemen.

These, together with Masinissa himself, who was wounded, he let slip, in a manner, out of his hands during the confusion.

The fugitives were in sight, and a body of horse, dispersed over the whole plain, pursued the five horsemen of the enemy, some of them pushing off in an oblique direction, in order to meet them.

The fugitives met with a very broad river, into which they unhesitatingly plunged their horses, as they were pressed by greater danger from behind, and carried away by the current were borne along obliquely.

Two of them having sunk in the rapid eddy in the sight of the enemy, Masinissa himself was supposed to have perished; but he with the two remaining had emerged among the bushes on the farther bank.